No coronavirus in TN; 242 from China under govt gaze: Minister

: Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijayabaskar on Friday asserted that there was no case of coronavirus in the state and said 242 people who returned from infection hit China were being monitored.

A day after he said 78 people who had arrived from the dragon nation were under 'house quarantine,' he told reporters at Pudukottai that the number of returnees has climbed to 242.

"As of today, 242 have arrived from China and the Public Health Department is in direct touch with all of them. They are all normal. There is no case of coronavirus in Tamil Nadu," he said.

Such returnees were being monitored and were under home quarantine, he noted.

As regards a techie who recently returned to his native place in Tiruvannamalai district from China, there was no manifestation of any cornavirus symptom in him, he said.

Hence, there was no need as of now to take the software engineer's blood sample to check if he had contracted the infection and similar was the status of a student who has come back to Krishnagiri district, he pointed out.

The minister asked people not to panic and wanted them to take precautions like washing their hands and ensuring personal hygiene since the pathogen may spread through airborne droplets.

Besides, a woman has tested positive for the virus in neighbouring Kerala, he noted.

The Dean, Madras Medical College and Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital, R Jayanthi, told reporters in Chennai that a 40-year-old woman who returned from China last night has been admitted in the isolation ward for observation though she was found to be normal.

The lady was referred to the RGGGH by a government facility in suburban Chennai after she had gone there with "very mild fever."
The top hospital authority said that the woman has been admitted for "only observation."